A technical workshop on wetlands was the setting at which the CLEANLEACH project was presented

IRTA researchers and firms related with the CLEANLEACH project presented the scientific, technical, and commercial goals of the developed leachate purification system.

The CLEANLEACH project was made public in November 2013 in the premises IRTA has in Cabrils; this project is part of the CEIP-Eco-innovation program - European Commission, within the framework of the transference workshop “Artificial wetlands for leachate purification of outside ground horticulture”, promoted by the Department of Agriculture.

The conference was held during the second part of the workshop and it began with a speech by IRTA´s researcher Rafaela Cáceres, who described the goals of the project and the main activities to be accomplished in the following two years. Next, it was the turn of Lola Narváez, who presented the results of her doctoral thesis on leachate purification through high nitrogen load, developed in IRTA Cabrils.

IRTA´s researcher Oriol Marfà described the main activities to be performed in the Cabrils center. The research will focus on improving the depurative capacity of the system, reduce the environmental impact, assess the elimination of pathogens, and deepen on the efficiency of the system linked with the microbiological aspects of the process.

Besides the scientific research, three associated firms will participate with the technical and commercial facets of the CLEANLEACH. Regarding this this matter, the creation by the bioengineering firms Naturalea and Salix of two full-size nurseries in the Maresme (Vivers Sala Garupera) and in Great Britain was announced.

The firm Buresinnova will search for new applications for the leachate purification system. The company´s manager, Sílvia Burés, pointed out some setting on which the CLEANLEACH system could be installed, including living architecture (living/plant walls and coverings) or leachate purification in nurseries and organic gardens. The intervention of Burés was followed by a final debate after which the workshop ended.